How long should I stay in school and on the academic track? I asked myself this question many, many times throughout college, graduate school, and my post-doctoral positions. A rare musing in the beginning, this question was constantly on my mind by the time I was in my first post-doctoral position. I departed actual academia for the pseudo-academia of the national labs when I took my second post-doctoral position, which only lasted two years before I joined a private company. I work with lots of students who get fed up in the middle of graduate school, contemplate quitting, and ask me for whatever guidance I can give. This question of whether to stay or go may be the hardest and most important question a young physicist faces. Below is short summary of my thoughts on the matter, organized by the stage of education you are in.
Undergraduate:
Clearly, your undergraduate years are a great time to explore. Majoring in physics can be a good choice, regardless of whether you want to go on to become a physicist in the traditional sense. For example, during my undergraduate days, a friend of mine reckoned (correctly) that majoring in physics would help him stand out from the crowd when applying to medical school and get him accepted to better programs. A bachelor’s degree in physics is a natural place to end your formal studies in the subject and head in another direction. Be aware, however, that a B.S. in physics will give you little opportunity to work as a “physicist.” Perhaps you can find a position as a technician or operator in a big lab with a B.S., but that is about it. If you want a good chance at a (reasonably) traditional career as a physicist, then you will need to go off to graduate school.
Graduate School – First Year or Two:
Hopefully, you thought long and hard about going to graduate school and are comfortable with the commitment you have made. Even so, you may find yourself having second thoughts when you get there. It is best to have those second thoughts early rather than late in graduate school. Academia might consider leaving with a master’s degree in physics a “crash landing” or a “wash out,” but the rest of the world probably will not. Say that you got to graduate school, wrapped up your master’s degree and then decided that a PhD is not the best value proposition for you. That is a legitimate story that is easy to sell. A master’s degree can be a great place to stop if your interests diverge from the traditional paradigm of getting grants, doing research, and publishing papers . Be aware, however, that you will still be playing at a disadvantage to PhD holders if you are seeking traditional physicist jobs, mainly because PhDs are produced in quantities much larger than traditional physicist job openings.
Graduate School – Years Three to Seven:
This is simultaneously the period during which you are most likely to want to quit and when it is most dangerous to do so. The middle years between the days of classes and finding a research group and the final sprint to graduation can be rough. A significant portion of the people who have sought me out for mentoring and career advice did so when they were thinking of quitting during their middle years. Generally, you do not want to quit at this point in graduate school. To paraphrase a friend of mine with vast experience in the venture capital world, a lot of people will assume you are a quitter if you give up towards the end of graduate school and no one hires quitters. Obviously, there are exceptions to this rule, but if you decide to leave at this stage, it is wise to have a very good story about why you left graduate school after investing a substantial amount of time and to tell that story early and often when looking for work.
First Post-Doctoral Position:
Two people have recently asked me if skipping post-doctoral positions and going straight to industrial jobs after graduation will hurt them in the long run. From my point of view, the answer is no. I am dubious about the idea that post-doctoral positions have any special education value that other sorts of jobs do not. To me, they are just work experience, so it is equally valid, perhaps preferable, to go straight to industry for your initial work experience. Unless, of course, you have still have your heart set on that professorship. Then you might have to put up with an indefinite number of post-doctoral positions while you churn out papers and academic job applications.
Post-Doctoral Positions Two, Three, . . . :
I did a second post-doctoral, but largely because my first was a one year “follow on” post-doctoral at my PhD institution, and my second was at a national laboratory and relatively well-paid. I generally advise thinking long and hard about doing more than two post-doctoral positions, assuming each is no more than three years. I have the distinct impression that the odds of landing a tenure track professorship start falling off rapidly past the fifth or sixth year of post-doctoral status. Simultaneously, I feel the odds of getting hired outside academia begin falling around the same time. If we see a résumé from someone who has spent seven or eight years in post-doctoral positions out in the “real world,” we start to wonder if the person in question can cope with a non-academic environment. Since the flow of new graduates never lets up, there is not much incentive to take a risk on someone who has spent nearly a decade in post-doctoral slots.